Awake
by Tuathail
Summary: A morning as quiet and gentle as this may be either the calm before the storm or at least the eye of said storm, but it's still very difficult to regret a single thing. Michiru and Haruka, set some time in SuperS.


Michiru is awake.

Most observers would remain oblivious to this fact - that is, would _not_ catch the slight change in rhythm in her breathing, feel the mattress shift subtly as she stirs, see the shadow of each eyelash quiver tentatively against her cheekbones as her eyelids threaten to flutter open - and just as Haruka catches these little details, Michiru catches the fact that Haruka is watching.

The latter is getting dressed, crossing their carpeted room in brisk strides; Michiru hears and feels this in the air as she keeps her eyes closed, the lingering peacefulness of sleep both somewhat unfamiliar and welcome as it envelopes her like the morning sun before seeping slowly away along the shadows, giving way to wakefulness.

When she speaks her voice is husky with sleep and, alert though her tone would suggest, her eyes remain closed.

"Are you in a hurry, Haruka?"

If she were to open her eyes now, she would see Haruka through vision blurry with sleep and too much exposure to the morning sun - Haruka's blonde hair wet and probably dripping just a little onto the carpet, wearing half her clothes and a small grin too aware to be entirely cocky, paused in the middle of their bedroom. "I am always on time, Michiru," she responds evenly, her amusement shining in her eyes. "It is someone else who is late."

Michiru's response is no more than a small smile that she trusts Haruka to catch in a passing glance or the understanding of long acquaintance. Haruka's voice comes now from the corner of the room as she dries her hair more thoroughly by the vanity.

"What did you dream of?"

The phantom chill of sheets drenched in cold sweat and waking at dawn with the end of the world burned firmly into her mind is a silent memory that has yet to disappear entirely from her consciousness - she doubts it ever shall. That word 'dream' - said with such light and hope by their Princess holding so much faith in the aspirations of the future, said with wry understanding by the two of them, until recently rarely unassociated with omens and dread – the word has come to be used so often that she could easily have forgotten the meaning commonly given to it.

Michiru rarely remembers her dreams nowadays - an odd thing to call a 'blessing', surely, but if nothing else it's that which makes a game of it all. She shifts on the bed and smiles. "Nothing."

The same amusement in Haruka's eyes permeates her voice as she approaches the bed, stray drops of water dotting out a careful trail. "Not at all?"

"Ah," Michiru replies, a teasing lilt to her tone striking and conspicuous for all her voice remains sleep-husky. "Were you hoping for a different answer?"

With these words she opens her eyes. Haruka's white shirt - unbuttoned casually, it sits _just so_ across her frame, her figure consciously ambiguous under its crisp cotton lines - is cast in sun and shadow from the light that filters in through Venetian blinds. _That_ borderline-smirk on Haruka's lips suggests the different answer they both were aware of and knew Michiru would not give – though she suspects that to dream of that particular subject matter would not be entirely difficult.

Haruka shoots her an amused glance –_ must you be so sharp so early in the morning?_ - and responds with a sweep of fringe half-concealing the laughter in her eyes. "Maybe."

Michiru has no illusions about her life. Whether these quiet, tender moments are the eye of the storm or the calm before it, the storm is the war they've chosen and she is long past the capability of even wishing it away. And yet -

Perhaps it is the lingering contentment of sleep. Here, like this, though she has never forgotten that they are soldiers, she has also never more acutely felt all the things they do not vocalise - that they are two girls who have found and chosen each other and are in love. Perhaps the morning light is deceptive as it drenches the world in a bath of gold, and yet – what is light is no less valid than what is dark and heavy, Michiru knows, and whichever of the three they may encounter in the future...

Being here like this, with Haruka, it's very difficult to regret a single thing.


End file.
